Pope Francis

Pope asks world leaders to ‘banish violence’

pope francis has called for a new style of politics built on peace and pleaded for disarmament, the eradication of nuclear weapons and an en...

Comments of the Week

the attacks on pope francis are reminiscent of the pharisees testing jesus sir – the wolves are circling around pope francis. a quick search...

The Catholic Herald

The light that never goes out

‘where would you choose to go on a retreat if you could travel anywhere in the world?” this was the question i was asked recently, a questio...

Bishop Mark Davies

The third coming of Christ

‘the coming of our god, our thoughts must now employ.” these words set the tone for our approach to christmas. the famous advent sermon of s...

Cardinal Vincent Nichols

The shirt that led St Thomas More to God

the reputation of st thomas more has for centuries survived the “shafts of falsehood and of folly”, to borrow a phrase of william cobbett, t...

Staying friends after Brexit

w hen pope john xxiii called for the second vatican council in 1959, he did not know fully what would be its outcome. he had an instinct, an...

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor

A heartbreak that transformed church music

anybody who has had but the slightest involvement with the musical life of his church, be he so high as music director, master of all he sur...

David Oldroyd-Bolt

The sacredness that secularism can’t hide

i first cared about being catholic, not out of any profound love for the person of christ, but out of a profound distaste for my other optio...

The secular side of the Middle Ages

a churchman living in east london despairs of his flock. “there are many people who do not believe that god exists, nor do they think that t...

Magical Christmas music from a witty hedonist

at some point in the coming days, buffeted by the frenzy and bombast of a 21st-century christmas, you may have the urge (and perhaps just a ...